Qualitative Data
by nolifeinabox
Summary: One day Reno's parents just...don't come home.


The slap throws his head to the side, and echoes in the small apartment, but he's too shocked for the hurt to set in at first. Neither of his parents hit very often, and he's never, ever been struck for doing something helpful. So when he looks up and the tears start pouring it's more from confused frustration than physical pain. Though his cheek is starting to burn, and sting now.

"M-Ma..."

"Oh baby, I'm so sorry." She drops to her knees in front of him, pulls him into a tight hug. "I'm sorry, you were just trying to help, right?"

"Uhuh"

"You stole that money didn't you?" He hiccups and nods, and she understands because her warm cheek is pressed up against his wet one. "Was it from someone you can find again, so you can give it back?"

"N-no..."

"Okay." She pushes him back by the shoulders and pries the offending wad of gil from his fist. It's a little damp now, where he'd tried to scrub the tears away, and very crumpled. "Just...never again, okay?"

"I'm n-not sorry."

"What?"

"I'm n-not sorry! You're always crying because there isn't enough m-money." His fists are still clenched, and he shakes with sobs that won't stop, but he doesn't look away when he says "You're always crying and f-fighting with Mr. Jacobi because there isn't enough money, and I c-cost too much. I eat too much f-food and I broke that plate and I grow out of my shoes."

"Oh honey..."

"I d-don't want you to be sad anymore. Who fucking cares where the m-money comes f-from!?"

"Reno! Language." She wraps him up again, because she doesn't know what else to do.

His father will be gone for months still, and the money he sends isn't enough anymore. They try to call him, but the calls don't go through.

Reno keeps picking pockets. He's good at it. "Never again" turns into "Not anyone we know. Not in this neighborhood."

-oOo-

His mother went to work over a week ago. She hasn't come home. He's never been by himself this long before. Instead of getting himself to school, like he knows he can and should, he spends the morning sitting in the short hall, watching the front door. Because he knows. He knows with every fiber of his being that she's going to come back any minute. Knows with every breath that she'll bring dad with her.  
And when she comes in she'll scold him for skipping school but she'll laugh and muss his hair and smell like oil from the factory and sweet pea from her shampoo, and dad will scoop him up like when he was small and his beard will be rough salty bristle and when he's put on his feet again he'll run to the kitchen and help ma make lunch while dad catches up on the months of news he's missed.

She's not gone. Everything will be alright. He loves them. They'll come back.

He's not...he's not a bad kid. They'll come back.

Morning bleeds hazily into afternoon. He knows because he's watched the patch of light from the window creeping along the floor. He's afraid to move. Like if he leaves this spot, then it's real. He makes it until the patch of light has moved from the floor to the wall, and is turning the sickly orange of the sinking sun. Hunger and thirst finally drive him out of the hall and into the kitchen.

He has to climb up on the counter to reach the box of powdered milk, and the rest of the food from the last time the lady downstairs had brought them a box from the church. No matter how he stacks and un-stacks and rearranges the remaining cans of pickled beets and pinto beans and the three remaining potatoes, it never looks like any more. He fixes a glass of milk, and eats half a can of beets, hides the rest away in the fridge with the leftovers that have gone bad.

That night he falls asleep in the hallway.

-oOo-

When Mr. Jacobi locked him out of the apartment he had begged, bargained, tried to shove what money he had gathered in the last weeks into the mans hands. If he wasn't here when his parents got back, how would they find him?

Mr. Jacobi says it with a sneer, but he knew it already, had known it since the day spent watching the sun creep across the floor.

They aren't coming back.

That knowledge did nothing to stop him kicking, and clawing and biting as he was dragged out to the street.

For the first three nights, he has no idea what he's doing. He hides in pipes with cat sized rats, and doesn't talk to anyone, and searches for food in all the wrong dumpsters.

He learns quickly.

Favor the dumpsters that serve food carts, and corner stores, not stands. The stand owners sometimes pour bleach over what they throw out, so no one will eat it. If Shinra has posted a sign on a boarded building, no one will bother you there. If there is no sign, chances are lawkeepers will be through to clear you out, and it will be crowded anyway. Respect rats. They've been doing this longer than you, and they can help you or hurt you depending on how much attention you're paying.

A beautiful child with wide wet eyes and quick fingers and quicker legs can do well for itself. It can do better when directed. There are plenty of gangs that will pay for his assistance.

The kids he runs with don't ask him to fight in the skirmishes over turf and pride that break out every few weeks. They're teaching him how to handle a knife and a gun and waiting until he's bigger. Doesn't stop him fighting anyway, for food and life and limb. Older kids often mistake him for an easy target, and plenty of adults think they can take whatever they want without paying. The piece of pipe he favors for self-defense quickly teaches them otherwise.

By the time he's nine, he's killed another child by accident, but doesn't know it. By the time he's ten, he's done it on purpose.

-oOo-

Children do not crave cages. But he sits bolt upright in his bed at Mr. Alder's, sweat drenched and praying wordlessly to the bars on the windows and the locks on the doors that keep the merchandise in for the night. He has only worked here a month, but for the first time in a long time, he has friends.

In his dream he hadn't though, they had all gone. Their whispers and conspiratorial giggles had echoed as he ran from room to room looking for them, growing quieter and further away with each step. There were no clients, no bouncers, no Mr. Alder. Just him. And then it hadn't been the brothel anymore but his parents apartment, and long long silence that swallowed even his footsteps, his breath, his frantically beating heart. He could see out the windows. Nobody went by in the street. All the other windows he could see were boarded up. There was only him.

But now, awake, he can hear the others breathing, and snoring, and shifting in their beds. He doesn't cry from relief. He does slip out of bed and pad over to the one directly across.

"Lisa." He breathes "Hey, Lisa?" Lisa is a year or two older. She's been here a long time. She's teaching him. She doesn't stir until he tentatively rests his hands on the side of the bed.

"Red?" Blinking "'Nother nightmare?" He nods. She sighs. "C'mere then, yo." She yanks him down and throws half her blanket over him. They lie back to back, not quite touching, but he can hear her breathing level out as she falls back asleep, and almost feel the heat through her pajamas.

It's been three years now. When he's grown, his sleep will still be sown with empty rooms and negative space.


End file.
